Semua Bab A Heart Gone for Good: Bab 1 - Bab 9

By the time I got home, I was coughing so hard it felt like my lungs were ripping apart.A 20-cent painkiller bought me four hours of relief. I needed three a day—just enough to keep me going until I finished paying for the plot next to my foster mother, Vera Johnson.I pushed too hard today. My stomach churned like someone was working a dull blade inside it. As I fumbled for the medicine, the door swung open. Jeremy stood there, scanning the room. His frown deepened into a hard knot."You don't have to ruin yourself just to put on this act. Things weren't so simple back then. We all had our reasons. I did what I had to."Jess saved my life. She donated one of her kidneys to me..."I jerked my head up, feeling as though I had just heard the biggest joke in the world. Just as I was about to speak, a small head peeked out from behind him.My heart nearly stopped.It was Oliver Grant.Five years had passed.Five years ago, I spent an entire day and night in labor to bring h

Instinct took over before I could think. I lunged at her and wrapped both hands around her throat. "How could you? She was your mother!"Jessica leaned against the wall and laughed through reddened eyes. "So what if she gave birth to me? We were switched, and I got the better life. That was fate. What right did she have to come looking for me? Did she really think she was worthy?"Her smile grew broader. "Anyone who's ever been kind to you, Madison, deserves to die."Blood dripped from my nose.It looked like I didn't have much time left.If I was going down, she was coming with me.A vicious slap cracked across my face. My head whipped to the side, and I slammed into the wall.Jeremy stood where he was, slowly lowering his hand."Have you made enough of a scene? Jess' health has never been the same after saving my life. You spent a few years taking her place. What exactly are you so aggrieved about?"You'll always be my wife. As long as you have that title, who would dare loo

The light above the operating room was still on.Jeremy leaned against the wall, absentmindedly rubbing the sauce stain on his sleeve. Suddenly, his heartbeat seemed to stop."Pull up all of Madison's medical records, and bring me the attending physician who performed my surgery back then."A series of memories surfaced in his mind.He remembered how Madison coughed up blood whenever the seasons changed, and how he had never once asked why.He remembered her severe hemorrhage when she gave birth to Oliver, and how his only concern had been that it delayed an important meeting.He remembered the Cesarean scar on her abdomen and how he had thought it was ugly.Now it all made sense.She had tried to tell him back then that she was the one who saved him, that she could never carry another child, that she was drowning in pain.But in the end, she never got the words out.Jessica had beaten her to it. She came with a fake document and took all the credit, and he had chosen to beli

I floated beneath the ceiling, looking down at the body lying on the operating table. It was pale, emaciated, and completely lifeless. A white sheet covered it up to the chin, but I could still see the face beneath—a face riddled with scars.A bitter smile tugged at my lips. In the end, I still hadn't saved enough money to buy the burial plot next to Vera.The hospital corridor in the early hours of the morning was as quiet as a graveyard. I tried drifting through the window, but something seemed to hold me back. I could only wander aimlessly above the hospital room.Then I saw Jeremy. He strode toward the room in a wrinkled shirt, his eyes bloodshot as he stared at the door. A streak of blood was still smeared across his cheekbone.The calm, controlled man I knew was gone. This version of him always came out when Jessica was involved.He paused at the doorway, then walked straight toward me. For some reason, I watched him pass right through my body.He whirled around, s